BEYONDTECH

SUPPORT TM

NEWS FROM THE EDGE

At Dynamic Edge, we do things differ-ently, because we understand the pain of working on a slow machine, only to have it freeze up right before that critical “Save.” We’ve all had bad experiences with 1-800-TechSupport. And we also know that, to rescue someone from a computer emergency, you have to go Beyond Tech Support.

After thirteen years of providing technol-ogy services to all types of businesses, we’ve learned that very few things are as frustrating as persistent computer in-

terruptions. So we’ve built a company of people, who want to help people like you find cost-effective solutions to pressing technology issues. With a team of highly trained and certified individuals, we can handle your toughest technology chal-lenges – without burying you in tech-talk.

From Network Design and Installation to Custom Database Construction, to Web Development, Smartphone Applications and much more, Dynamic Edge delivers powerful results through our people-cen-tered approach.

Who is Dynamic Edge?A law office we support has an old, out-dated, poorly written website that bounces 99% of its visitors and generated $0 in revenue last year.

Another one of our clients says his web-site is “working just fine.”

To my faithful readers that I have built trust with, I’m sorry, because I just lied to you-- I didn’t actually ask another client about his website… I asked the same client.

When I ask business owners about their websites, most often I find they haven’t thought about how their website should (or could) be working. They usually say, “Billy handles the website, I stay out of it!”

Is just “existing” enough? The lawyer I spoke of earlier would check to make sure his website was online every morn-ing, and to him, that meant it was working. This is like flipping through a yellow pages book to find your phone number and say-ing, “Yep, it’s there!”

My two cents: Your website should sell. No matter what your business does, if you can’t connect the dots from a sale back to your website, your website isn’t working.

There are really three areas to address when getting your website working: Get-ting Them There, Keeping Them There, Getting Them to Buy.

Continued on Page 2...

Bruce’s Business Tips:Does Your Website Really Work?

Above is an up close look at possibly the most talked about, hyped-up tech device of a generation!

For those who have been living under a rock, “Google Glass” is a wearable com-puter with a little tiny display that brings information into your line of sight. Google has shipped out the first batch of these wearable computers to testers, so you may see some of these out there in the wild.

Google will probably continue testing Glass for all of 2013, and are currently on schedule to make them available to the public sometime in 2014.

This is the first truly exciting and poten-tially game changing thing to happen to computers since the iPad. Here are some of the things Google says Glass can do:

▪ Take Picture or Video of what you’re looking at with voice command.

▪ Share live video ▪ Turn-by-turn Navigation ▪ Send text messages with voice

command ▪ Get answers to questions with voice

command (ala Siri) ▪ Translate your voice ▪ Location aware alerts (i.e. Flight info

when you are at the airport)

Gadget Alert!When creating Office documents with pictures (letter head, screen shots, etc), compress pictures to print faster, save ink, and reduce file size for e-mailing!

Office 2003: Right click an image in the document, select “Format Picture”. Then click “Compress” in the bottom left corner. Click the “All pictures in document” and “Print” radio buttons and Check “Compress Pictures” and “Delete cropped areas of pictures”. Click “OK.”

Office 2007: Double click on a picture within the document. This should bring up the “Picture Tools” ribbon at the top of the page, just above the ruler. Click on “Compress Pictures”. Leave “Apply to Selected Pictures Only” box unchecked. Click “Options” to choose how much you want to compress (Print, Screen, or E-mail). Click “OK’ to get out of the Options menu, then Click OK again to compress the pictures.

Office 2010: Almost the same as 2007. Double click picture, find the Compress Pictures icon, click OK. (that’s the com-pressed version of a tutorial!)

Once pictures are compressed, a 30 page print job that took 10 minutes will take about 30 seconds!

Office Tip:Compress Your Pics!

TechTown got it’s start in 1999 when “Wayne State University President Irvin D. Reid decided the city needed an incu-bator that could help stimulate the local economy...”

Today, TechTown is an agent of change for the city. Their mission is to: “ac-celerate economic growth in Detroit by growing strong businesses and driving regional collaboration.”

They help startups by teaching them about how to get funding and assisting them in securing the funding. They also rent space in their building for budding companies to use before they have their own home.

So, is it working? In the past 5 years alone, TechTown has helped 647 com-panies and created over 1,000 jobs. In 2011, these companies generated $52 million dollars.

If you are interested in touring TechTown or renting space at their facility, e-mail facilities@techtown.org

MAY 2013

“When you’re having a technology crisis, the last thing you need is a fast-talking, know-it-all who doesn’t let you explain a problem; and then

acts like you have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Google Glass may be closer than you think!

NEWS FROM THE EDGE

Page 1, Continued on 2 Page 2 Page 2

IN THIS ISSUE:

BEYONDTECH

SUPPORT TM

Extended Content @: www.dynedge.com

Bruce’s Business Tips:Does Your Website Really Work?Find out how to create a website that sells!

Power Up:Hold Onto Your Smart Phones!Is Apple responsible for the latest rash of iPhone thefts?

N00B UPDATE!Meet this month’s two new Dynedgers-- Michael Bolton and Chris Phillips!

Sure, you have a firewall and antivirus. Your laptop is encrypted. You never con-nect to public wi-fi. You’ve even been trained on spotting phishing scams. You are an alert, tech savvy consumer who isn’t likely to be duped into giving up your personal or company’s private data. But how strong is your grip??

The latest crime fad that could cause a data breach at your company is called “Apple Picking”. It’s a literal smash-and-grab approach to stealing your smart phone, and everything on it.

Why Is This Happening? Well, a sto-len iPhone 5 currently sells for about $500 cash. I know what you’re thinking: “Well, they can track my iPhone and bust those crooks immediately!” You would think so, wouldn’t you?

Well, the fact is, they don’t catch these crooks. Once a phone is disconnected from the internet, they can’t track it, and the crooks know this. Then, all the thief has to do is change the “unique identifier”, and Viola! Your phone disappears forever.

There is currently a database that suppos-edly helps prevent reactivation

of stolen phones, but it only works by tracking that unique identifier. Once it has

been changed, the phone is off the map com-pletely.

Who’s Responsible? Law enforcement officials believe the cell phone manufac-turers and carriers aren’t doing enough to quell the thefts. Cops can’t catch the thieves without the phone companies upgrading their antitheft technology. It is simply too easy for someone to modify the unique identifier and reactivate a stolen phone. If it was harder to get away with using a stolen phone, stealing phones would be less profitable, and thefts would go down.

Right now, stealing phones is big busi-ness, like stealing cars was in the 1990’s. The car companies have finally made it harder for crooks to get away with steal-ing cars. (i.e. you can’t just jimmy the lock and hot-wire a Caddy anymore.) So, lo and behold, the criminals have shifted their focus. Cell phone thefts now account for about 40% of all robberies in America.

What You Should Do: Be alert and hold on tight! Be mindful when your phone is out and be aware that some people might want to steal it. You wouldn’t walk down a crowded street waving five $100 bills around, so treat your phone the same way.

Need help monitoring, finding, or securing your smart phones? Give Bryan a call and ask about our Mobile Device Support.

Hold Onto Your Smart Phones!Is Apple responsible for recent iPhone crime wave?

Getting “Them” There:

One key item that I’m skipping over: You need to know who “Them” is. This is Marketing 101: Know Your Target. In or-der to prevent writing a book instead of an article, I must assume you all know who “Them” is. In this case, I will use “Them” to mean your specific target market.

Two ways your targets find your web-site: Organic Search or PPC. PPC is paying for clicks, like Google Adwords or Banner ads. Basically, the more you pay the more visitors. Increasing Organic Traf-fic (free clicks) is what we are going to fo-cus on today.

Getting your website to naturally show up in Google searches has to do with:

▪ Code: Was your site built with sloppy programming code?

▪ Freshness: How recently were your pages created or updated?

▪ Relevance: Can the search engine relate your site to what was searched for?

▪ Links: How many other sites link back to your content?

▪ Crawl-able: Can the Google Robots easily navigate your site and grab bits of content?

We will get more in-depth with some of these topics in the next section.

Keeping “Them” There:

So they clicked a link to your site. Maybe

you paid for the click, maybe it was organ-ic, but the question is, what now? If they leave without navigating to another page, that is called a “bounce”. Ways to keep your precious visitors from bouncing:

▪ Relevant Content: Does what they see immediately reflect what they were expecting?

▪ Easy to Navigate: Can they quickly find the answer to whatever they are looking for?

▪ Good Content: Sure it’s relevant, but is your content worth reading? This is your chance to be the expert they are looking for.

▪ Recent Updates: Was your last blog posted in ’99?

▪ Visually Appealing: Does your website look hokey or rinky-dink?

Getting “Them” to Buy:

Here’s the tricky part. If you have a great product that people want to buy, the hard part is done. Now, all you have to do is:

▪ Clear Message: Can they tell exactly what you sell and why they need it within 5 seconds?

▪ Present An Offer: Something to get them to pull the trigger. Tell them exactly what they should do and how quickly they need to do it.

▪ Direct Response: Have direct response forms on your pages. Remove all road blocks and make it as easy as possible for them to contact you. Once they submit, it’s on you to close the sale!

▪ Easy Buying Portal: If you accept credit cards and sell directly off your website, make sure your portal works well. They should be able to search and buy easily (and securely). Any speed bumps along the way may send them to your competitors!

Now you have the general framework for a website that works. So the question is; Does yours work?

You can find out by claiming a free 13 point website inspection from our in-house-web-guru Skyler. He has some openings and now is a great time to get on his calendar for web work.

Just call or e-mail Bryan or Deb and men-tion the newsletter! Again, we have limited capacity, so we will only accept the first 7 requests for this free inspection.

~Bruce

Bruce’s Business Tips:

Does Your Website Really Work?

...Continued from Page 1

Gerald BennettGerald double ma-jored at Eastern Michigan University and received degrees in both Theatre and

Communications. Though the acting work has been slow, Gerald has used his outstanding organizational and com-munication skills doing everything from managing restaurants to selling telecom. Now, he fits in perfectly with the DE team as our Project Administrator!

On the lighter side…

Gerald has never been in a movie, but he is constantly preparing for his big break. Like the old school greats, Ger-ald is a student of Method Acting, and he becomes fully immersed in his char-acters. He once managed a restaurant for seven years after he heard Disney was working on a movie with a chef as the lead role. It turns out the movie was animated, and Gerald’s dream role went to a cartoon rat.

After the Ratatouille fiasco, Gerald de-cided to give up acting for good. It was time to just be himself for once. He took his rigorous preparation skills and ap-plied them to his new job, managing projects at Dynamic Edge. What he doesn’t know is DE just signed a con-tract with Universal Studios to produce a big-budget summer block buster about saving the world from evil computers!

Update: The role of Gerald in next sum-mer’s, “Dynamic Edge – Episode IV: A New Hope” will be played by Johnny Depp.

MAY 2013

340 Harrison Street Nashville, TN 37219 615.526.2626 help@dynedge.com www.dynedge.com

PO

WE

R

UP

Fixed IT: Saving the World One Computer at a Time

If your business is using “pay-as-it-breaks” computer support, I’d bet your issues never

actually get fixed, do they?

With Fixed IT, we pro-actively monitor & protect your entire network, so it doesn’t break in the first place.

Consider your computer

saved.

Michael “it-was-my-name-first” Bolton: Michael was actually born 3 years before singer Michael “Bolotin” changed his name to Michael Bolton.... or so he told me. I did some fact checking however, and Michael Bolotin changed his name to Michael Bolton for his 1983 release entitled, Michael Bolton. So, in summary, Michael Bolton (pictured left) is either wrong, or he’s 31 years old.

Chris “regular-name” Phillips: Chris is not named after an 80’s sing-er, and he’d be tickled pink if you said he looked 31 years old. He’s also a father of 3, an old skool hip hop aficionado, and he can’t stand 2 out of 3 Michael Boltons. The third, yet to be mentioned Michael Bolton, is a char-acter from the classic movie Office Space, which Bruce has never seen. And FYI, Chris likes our Michael Bolton, not the other two.

What is a :Q“Good” Website?

A: Onethat sells.

BEYONDTECH

SUPPORT TM

NEWS FROM THE EDGE